


Moonshine Lake

by Jyagantz, PumpkinSpite



Category: Overwatch (Video Game)
Genre: Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Fantasy, Childhood Friends, Crack, Doomfish, Fish People, Fluff and Angst, Friends to Lovers, Halloween, Halloween AU, Interspecies Romance, Junkenstein, M/M, Mermaids, Slow Burn, halloween terror
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-10-11
Updated: 2018-11-13
Packaged: 2019-07-29 11:18:47
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 8
Words: 13,187
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16263122
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Jyagantz/pseuds/Jyagantz, https://archiveofourown.org/users/PumpkinSpite/pseuds/PumpkinSpite
Summary: Self-indulgent as hell AU fic about a boy meeting a fish creature and their unusual love story.Trigger Warnings: Homophobia, Bullying, Animal Cruelty, Drug Abuse, non-explicit Interspecies SexTags and triggers will be expanded if needed; this fic is unbeta'd.





	1. Strangers

The Junkenstein family was a small institution. In fact there used to be a whole clan attached to the name, but only three of them were left behind in the small town of Adlersbrunn. Those would be the traveling merchant Lord James Richard Junkenstein, his wife of over twenty years Camilla and finally, their God given gift, their little son James, lovingly called Jamison.  
The Junkensteins loved their son, as for over a decade they had tried to conceive an heir to their name and land. The more they treasured the boy, fed him well and kept him proper.  
And like a true mother Camilla saw only the best in Little James. "He is such a smart child. He leaned to walk so early on and he could already write his name at tender three years old." she had cooed with former servants of the household.  
Much to her husband's dismay, who loved their son just as much as she did but was more grounded in his world view as a former soldier to the Adlersbrunn guard. "He might be smart but he will need a proper education to put his talents to use."

After he was able to talk Jamison got home schooled. The teachers were pleased with him but everyone working in the Junkenstein household knew the boy was a force of nature. Outside of his mother's guarding eye he would climb on furniture, draw on walls with ink or steal kitchen tools to make himself armor to fight against the neighbor's German shepard as if it was a dragon. Jamison was full of energy and it drove his parents who were both already in their fourties to their knees. They confused avoiding stress with taking care of their son, secluding him from the outside world more and more. The boy grew awfully lonely, surrounded by servants and teachers, his parents growing busier with every year and his frustration over it turning the once energetic child to a timid little soul who prefered books over human company.  
But then, one night - Jamison was nine years old - he found his first ever friend. In the most unlikely of places.

That night Jamison snuck out of the house. It was way too easy for the boy to avoid the guarding eyes of the servants and the door in the kitchen that led to the garden was old enough for a child to unlock with a simple old spoon. He liked the garden at night time. Mother's flowers would shimmer in muted colors through the night and the herbs were let to grow wildly, filling the late spring air with the gentle scent of lavender and basil. In the far back, past the old willow tree with his swing set and the white rose bushes, was the boy's favorite spot in the garden. Framed by large bushes with evergreen needles was a white fountain, carved out of stone. It looked older than the house, even though this couldn't possibly be, as Father kept saying he bought the house with the fountain back in the day. The water stains left it looking withered and used, and Jamison really liked that. People barely went into the far back of the garden, as its fence of green shuttered it from initial sight. Sometimes the gardener came through to remove weeds, and to see if the water still ran, but that's it.  
Jamison liked this spot. He spent many days watching the water of the surprisingly deep fountain run and reflect in the light. He liked the noise of the water hitting the stone and the smell of wetness. This was chosen isolation, not the one forced onto him by his parents. The kind of isolation he wished he was able to share...  
The boy barely touched the cold stone to sit at the edge of the fountain, when a noise startled him. Something was beyond the bushes. Jamison had climbed through a hole between the needles before, he knew of the little bit of forest behind it, as its trees grew higher than the roof of his home.  
He inched closed and peaked through, seeing only vague shapes. The little boy took a deep, brave breath in before he dug through the bushes, scratching his hand on a twig. He couldn't ignore the noises, because he knew these noises way too well: Crying...

The crying became louder the more the forest went down a little steep. Jamison held on to the trees as to not stumble over the roots poking from the ground as he made his way down. He saw water running. That's right, there was a river running through this forest. Maybe this was where the fountain got its water from.  
Once by the water Jamison looked around, trying to locate the crying. He followed the stream downward, until he was close enough to make out a bundle laying on the ground near the water. The boy gasped. At first he thought it might be an otter or another animal, but it was way too big for that. With green-blue scales shimmering in the moonlight, Jamison saw what looked like a little boy with large blue fins on his neck sit near the water, crying his eyes out.   
Jamison tried to close his mouth from the awe. He had never seen a creature like this before. Curiously he came closer. The fish boy had no hair and his scales looked weirdly dull. Maybe he was covered in mud, Jamison could barely tell through the darkness. He also noticed that little tail that reminded him of a frog's tadpole tail. And then he saw the blood. The side of the boy's leg was scratched open, as if he cut himself on a stone.  
"Oh no." Jamison spoke up and regretted it, because the fish boy spun around, his enormous dark eyes staring at Jamison before snarling and hissing, showing an impressive set of teeth.  
The boy raised his hands. "No, no, no, please don't be scared!"  
The fish child twitched, his face turning to a confused one. Jamison swallowed his own spit. This wasn't what he had expected would ever happen to him. This was...exciting.  
Slowly he lowered his hands and inched towards the scaled boy. The cut didn't look deep but it was dirty and probably still hurt a lot, given that the fish was still weeping, his almost black dark green eyes shimmering from tears.   
Jamison went on his knees. "Come. I carry you."  
The fish boy shook his head as Jamison tried to touch him to pick the smaller child up. So he _did_ understand him.  
"You sure you can stand? It looks bad." Jamison returned but the fish child, somehow managed to get onto his one, very shaky leg.  
"I'm....warrior..." came out in heavy voice, even for a kid. His tongue wasn't used to so much strain.  
Jamison got up again and hopped over to give his unusual find support. "There's a fountain in our garden. We can wash your leg in it."  
The fish wanted to protest. He obviously didn't like getting help forced onto him, but he barely had a choice. Jamison was sure, if an adult had found him the poor fella would be tossed into a circus, or worse, end as someone's dinner.

The way up was a struggle, mostly due to the fish's limited mobility and Jamison's lack of fitness. Still, they got up, even when it meant Jamison's pants would be stained with mud and grass. No one will never know though if he hid them lower in the laundry pile.  
Once through the bushes Jamison helped the fish sit down at the rim off the fountain. "Here you go. You can clean your legs in the water." He pulled out a handkerchief from his back pocket, that was big enough to wrap twice around his head. "Then I cover it up with this."  
The fish boy hummed and while he did turn to bath his feet in the fountain he didn't clean out the wound. He just moved his feet around in the water.  
Jamison removed his large glasses for a moment, wiping them clean on his shirt. "You, uh...who are you?" The question came out sheepishly. The naivety of a child can be strong, every when faced with what others would call a monster.  
The fish boy glanced up, the sad features slowly soften as his hand reached to his wrist, a little bracelet made of seashells hanging on it. "Ahm...I am..."  
Curiously Jamison climbed next to the boy, undoing his muddy shoes. "You look like a fish." he commented.  
The big, translucent fins of the boy flailed up. "I am no simple fish! I am a warrior! My flock is the best along the Cold Shores!"  
"Sssshhh!" Jamison leaned in with his finger against his lips. "My parents are asleep..."  
The no-simple-fish boy held his mouth shut with both hands. A glance over the hedge, praying no lights were on. The darkness was a relief. Slowly the blond boy rolled up the legs of his pyjamas to slowly sink his feet into the cold water. "Okay. Warrior. Got it. But...do you have, like, a name?"  
"Everyone has a name." came as a reply, as if Jamison's question was the most well known thing in the world.  
The blond boy giggled a little. "Sure, but what is your name? Here, I'll tell you mine, too, if you tell me yours." He reached out his hand. "I'm James Junkenstein."  
With big eyes the scaled boy looked at the hand in confusion. He poked Jamison's palm with one of his cool fingers, causing the boy to twitch back and giggle. "Hey! That tickles."  
Fins flailed up again and something akin to a laugh bubbled up from the fish boy. He then raised his hand to pat his own shoulder twice. "Akande."  
Jamison rubbed his palm before he started to smile. Was that a greeting? He mirrored the motion, knocking with a flat hand again his left shoulder and the boy's eyes started to gleam.


	2. Friends

Akande was Jamison's first friend. The little fish boy - or mer, as his people seemed to be called - was a quiet child, balancing out Jamison's tendency for hyperactivity. The two kids mostly met when Jamison was alone at home or at night. They would either spent all day at the fountain or near the stream behind the house. Akande needed to keep his fins and skin wet to be able to breath on land. Jamison sometimes even brought a watering can with him for an impromptu shower. Sometimes Jamison brought food with him. Akande could practically eat anything growing in and around the water, but leftovers from last Friday's fish dinner were always appreciated.  
Whenever they met, they would play together. Jamison never had someone to play with before, aside from the occasional game of badminton with his mother or a round of chess with his math teacher. Hide and seek was off of the line up of games from day one, Akande would hid in the deeper water of the fountain's basin. Very unfair, as Jamison couldn't exactly breath under water. They played Catch one night, running around the back of the garden. Catch often turned into wrestling, the childish version of it anyways, with rolling over the grass and trying to hold the other down. Akande often won. Despite his size the boy was surprisingly strong. But then again Jamison wasn't exactly sporty.  
When they didn't play, Jamison would read Akande from his favorite books. The two argued sometimes about the stories. Especially the travel novels Jamison's father often brought home.  
"This is wrong." Akande would argue. "My flock eldest knows tribes like those. They don't eat their people. But they eat mussels and that's gross."  
Jamison believed Akande.  
If Jamison would have been older than eight years, he'd probably questioned how a creature, that obviously belonged onto the depth of the ocean, was able to speak any human language, especially one as complicated as English. But through his childish naivety and awe he was able to figure things out for himself. Of course mers can speak the human language. They are exposed to them, whether they like it or not. Traders and explorers and hunters. Humans are not going to harm someone who spoke their language. And from what Akande had told him, his family has met a few humans before.  
Akande told him more about his flock. They live in the oceans, never rest at one spot. But they always return to the rivers of these lands every few years. The waters here are warm and deep, perfect to hatch new offspring.  
"I was hatched in the open!" Akande told one night, chest swollen in pride. "Almost got eaten. But I was strong enough to survive other fish trying to eat me. That's why I got this." He would point out a specific, rose-brown seashell on his bracelet. Like a soldier showing off his medals. Maybe he was a warrior after all.  
"Why do you have all of those?" Jamison asked and eyed the seashells with envy almost. He always wanted to collect seashells when his mother took him to the shore, but she never let him ran through the sand in fear he might make his shoes dirty.  
Akande picked on one of the pointy shells. "Token. My flock gives them away to show their love. Look." He turned his wrist, showing many shapes and colors. "This one is from Mama, this is from one of my brothers, this one is...my father's and uh, the one here...it's..."  
The mer's voice, rough even for a child, became low and quiet. Jamison has seen this face often in the three months the two have spent together. He has also noticed, how the translucent fins on his neck have started to become pale and sickly and grey instead of a gentle blue.  
The boy came closer and put his arm around the mer.  
"You miss them."  
The fish boy continued to pick on his bracelet. The single quiet sob was answer enough.

Children are often selfish people. Jamison often felt lonely despite being surrounded by people. Akande was the first person he could do things with he always wanted to but never could: Play, run, laugh, share. Jamison was a sheltered child, locked up in a golden cage. But he was at least amongst his own. Akande was far away from his family. From siblings and parents and other friends.  
Children might be selfish, but they are rarely cruel.

Jamison spent a whole week on his plan. Hidden behind the bushes he used an empty barrel from Father's wine cellar and the housekeeper's tool box to knock wheels onto it. Why he would do that and hide the project out of sight from his parents, Jamison didn't explain to Akande. Until one night the blond boy came running, his usual pyjamas changed to tight boots and short pants. On his back was a bag, no doubt filled with food and in his hand a bucket. Akande blinked at him, once he poked his head through the hedge and watched the little boy fill up the barrel with the water from the fountain.  
"What are you doing?"  
Jamison grinned wide. "I'll take you to the shore! Duh!"

A trip to the shore took almost one and a half hours in a carriage. But he can't take the mer out for over an hour without water. And which carriage rider would actually take two little boys to the shore without pay? Especially when one of them had fins and scales. So they had to walk. But to keep Akande wet Jamison built him a Barrel On Wheels. Or BOW for short as he called it. The boy pushed and pulled the water-filled basin with his friend inside up and down the roads towards the shore, making their nightly trip long and tiring, especially for a little child. But Jamison worked himself through. Despite strained muscles and tired eyes, the boys managed to find their way to the shore by four in the morning.  
The boys talked in between, but it wasn't like any of their other conversations.  
"What are you even doing?"  
Jamison paused. "I...I help you get home."  
"You don't want me to stay?"  
"Yes, but...you are sad and you miss your family. I don't want you to be sad. I rather help you get safe to a river before you hurt yourself."  
"Humans like to lock us away to keep us out of the water, my father told me. You could just do that."  
"But I don't want to lock you in somewhere! You need your family."  
The sandy dunes were disturbed by the cool wind, the first sign of the incoming fall. The algae were dying and covering the surface of the enormous river and swam down the stream in a gentle pace. Jamison climbed onto a near-by stone to reach and help Akande from his barrel.  
"If you follow the stream up you should find a way to the North sea in no time! May your family hasn't moved too far yet."  
With sand stuck between his toes Akande watched the water move before he turned to Jamison.

The boys smiled at each other. And for the first time Jamison felt a sting in his guts, hard enough to start sobbing out of nowhere. He doesn't want him to leave. He doesn't. But he had to. He might die if he doesn't, he reasoned, and while the fatality of death has not real sunken into his childish mind, he still knew that this would be a worse fate to Akande than him loosing a playmate.  
Akande, but a child himself, started to tear up. Within moments the two boys hugged each other, their tears wetting each other's shoulders.  
Jamison laughed between sobs. "Fine warrior you are, you crybaby..."  
Akande knocked against Jamison's back with a flat hand. "S-shut up! A warrior is allowed to be sad, too!" The blond boy laughed again.  
"I...I will come back. Once my flick has new hatchlings. I'll go with them. And then we meet again and play. Promise?" the fish boy hummed against Jamison's shoulder and Jamison nodded, glasses clouding up from his tears.   
"And...and I will read you more fairy tales. I promise."  
They stayed like that for many minutes, before the mer, with weak shoulders, walked into the river and let the water float him down, waving after his human friend one last time before diving into the safe depths. Only now, knowing his friend wouldn't be able to hear him, Jamison let go, weeping loud and devastated. He kept crying all the way back home that he walked much, much slower and with a weight on his heart heavier than the barrel had ever been.

He came home at seven in the morning, greeted by his almost hysterical mother. Of course she had noticed Jamison's weird nightly activities, heard him talk to himself as if he was talking to another person. But having an imaginary friend was one thing, pretending to take said imaginary friend to the riverside shore to "set them free" and also stealing tools and one of Father's barrels for that was something else. Jamison was grounded for a week. As soon as Richard would return, Camilla would talk to him about the possibility of finding their son a doctor to talk to.


	3. Summers

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Content Warning: Mentioned Death and Animal Cruelty

It had been over a year since Jamison last saw Akande, and just like his mother wanted he was send to a doctor about that. The doctor, an old man with lots of patience and little believe in the tales of fish people living under the sea, had a simple diagnosis.  
"Your boy is lonely. Children often work though their hardships with play and pretend. He needs to be around his own peers more often. Then he might stop dreaming up mermaids."  
This was much to Camilla's dismay. She rather knew her son being brought up safe and sound within their home. After all, children can be cruel to those with a bright mind like her dear little James.  
So she sent him to public school after the summer. Her fears settled in within weeks. Jamison was easily distracted, whatever the teachers talked about he learned two years before in his private lessons. He tried to connect with other kids. He remembered how he did it with Akande. Slow and friendly. But sadly he was already marked to be the weird know-it-all rich kid. His classmates would beat him up when they had a bad day, channeling their frustrations over their own problems into the weak boy and letting them out with their fists.  
Camilla wanted to have Jamison back at home, but Richard refused. "Let him. He needs to learn that the world is cruel. Maybe this way he will also learn how to stop being such a mimosa. After all, do you want your son to become our heir or to become some gay weirdo?"

Jamison couldn't sleep that one night. He had been playing sick for the past week. The last beating and his father's judgement was too much for his pride, he rather hid away in his room and work on fixing that old clock that used to belong to his grandfather. The boy's weak fingers brushed over his clothed arm that hid bruises and cuts. They still stung.

The night seemed awfully loud. Wind blew through the willow's leaves, cicadas already humming despite the spring just slow crawling to an end. He stepped to the window, leaving his work behind on the table. Maybe he'd feel better if he'd take a walk through the garden.  
For the first time in ages he slipped on light feet out of the house and felt the grass tingle his feet as he stepped outside, sitting down at the swing set. His shoulders felt heavy.  
It doesn't matter what he would do. He will probably be alone. Maybe he did just dream of Akande...maybe he could...

The boy spun around when he heard a noise. Leaves rattling at the bushes startled him. He mad a step back when he saw a claw break through the needles of the bushes framing the fountain. No. This can't be.  
"A...Akande?"  
The green claw followed a green arm covered in blue spots, and that followed the familiar frame of the mer, crawling from the bush and coughing. His neck fins have grown smaller and blue spots were covering his arms and cheeks like freckles, but yes, it was Akande.  
The mer jerked his head up and showed a toothy grin. "James!"  
Jamison sobbed and ran to the mer, almost throwing him to the ground again as he hugged him. Even if he was a fantasy, even if he was just make believe, it didn't matter to Jamison. He had his best friend back, and it drew the boy to tears.  
Akande held him as well, having grown a few inches in the past year, finally being eye to eye with the frankly pretty tall Jamison. "I missed you so much."  
"I missed you too." Jamison muttered and rubbed off his tears with his arm. "You...you really came back."  
"I promised I would, didn't I?" He reached for Jamison's wrist. "Come on! My flock is waiting!"

And Akande pulled Jamison with him, down to the stream behind the house, following against the flow towards the nearby woods. The Moonshine meadows led into the narrow woodwork and past a little patch of muddy ground to the old lake. Jamison has only been here once, and on that day he got his head dunk into the cold but surprisingly fresh water. Tonight however, the lake was a lively spot. Mers, in many sizes in all the shades of blue, green and even purple that the boy could imagine, swam around, examined the plants growing on the shore or played at the tiny waterfall that the stream made when it ended in the lake. Nervously Jamison held Akande's hand with his own two and hid a little behind him. A few of the twenty or so mer folk glanced towards them.  
"It's...is that your flock?"  
Akande nodded and patted his left shoulder twice. The curious mer returned the gesture.  
Slowly he led Jamison along the shore, towards a group of mer sitting on a log. They seemed to be building a nest out of grass and seaweed. One of them, a very large and bulky looking mer, covered in scars and with a dark blue back looked up and smiled as they saw Akande. There was a pat on the shoulder and in the same motion they closed their fist over their heart.  
"You are back, my pearl." Jamison has not expected such a soft voice to come from this large mer. In fact he hasn't even expect it to be female as it seemed.  
Akande returned the gesture with the fist before pulling Jamison closer. "James, this is my mother, Ade."  
The boy swallowed before shyly patting with a shaky hand against his shoulder. The mother seemed pleased.   
"Do you want to help us make a net? It's for the eggs later." Akande asked and sat down with his mother, picking up the end of the net that was still loose. Jamison carefully climbed over to sit by Akande, who's eyes lit up.

What started as something being waved off as a child's daydreams made up in his loneliness became a new routine in Jamison's life. From late spring to early fall the flock would now reside in the Moonshine Lake, fearing being in the open waters will kill more of their offspring each year. During that time the boy would visit them after school or at nighttime, so much so that he was almost there daily. The mer, while always careful and suspicious of humans, didn't dislike his presence. Akande especially tried to show Jamison how they lived their daily life. In exchange Jamison taught him and other members of the flock things about humans. Like why they have to wear clothes or why they eat something as gross as mussels. He even brought one of his old suits with him for the mer children to try on. It proved to be very small for Akande. He rather showed Jamison how they weaved the skirts they wore. Apparently they are supposed to make them look to predators like piles of floating seaweed.  
Akande also showed Jamison how they braid their bracelets and other jewelry. 

On his eleventh birthday Jamison was gifted his own bracelet by Akande, that had a snail house on it.  
The boy felt flustered when given the jewelry. "I...don't think boys are supposed to wear jewelry." he hummed, remembering the taunts of his classmates when one of them got an earring.  
Akande, who's blue coat had slowly taken over his body, was confused by that. "Humans has strange customs when it comes to your mateship manners I've noticed. Look, I'm not going to force you to wear the shell braid, but...it's...important to me for you to have it."  
Jamison took the gift. And for the first time felt a strange tingle in his gut when he saw that smile on the mer's features.  
The year was also the first time Jamison was present when the first babies of that year hatched. A mer flock would always collect their eggs and shelter them in big nets to drag them along wherever they went.   
"Not all of the eggs hatch because not all of them are fertile." Ade explained to the boys once. "You can't tell from the outside. This is why there are always so many and that's why we have often many children. Only those who manage to push through survive and thrive as the next generation."

Jamison noticed how much emphasis the flock put in strength and fight. Conflicts rarely end in physical fights, but the mer sure loved to test boundaries. The moment some of the babies from last year's nest were able to see and walk, they would try to climb everything they could see. Including Jamison, who shot into the air like a beanpole after his twelfth birthday. He blamed his mother's genes, she was remarkably tall for a woman.  
"Father died this winter." he muttered quietly as Akande and him sat by the far end of the lake that year, watching the rest of the flock, that had shrunken significantly.  
"I'm sorry." Akande returned, hand twitching. "Did he have to suffer?"  
"He had that infection for a while. But he was too stubborn to listen to my mother's pleads." He glanced, noticing the twitch of the hand. A little voice in his head wanted that hand to reach for his own and he couldn't explain why.  
"We lost many as well. Almost half of our people. Most of them were not even old enough to speak yet." His voice was heavy, his head hanging. The past year had left a mark on Akande, his back and arms showed scars from a shark's bite. Jamison wanted to hug him, but stayed reserved. Fourteen and twelve years old was too young to lose someone you love. Can you ever be too old to mourn? He hoped to never find out.

Summers would come and go and Jamison would grow to become the outcast he was predestined to be. He was a good student, did remarkably well in biology and mathematics. His teachers were hopeful that the boy had a bright future ahead. If only he would stop being so foulmouthed at other students.  
After one too many years he decided to fight back, even if it was just with words. Sick of taunts and abuse and the sad eyes Akande always got when he saw a new bruise on Jamison's pale skin.  
"These children don't deserve your sympathy. If I was you I would have broken their jaws five times by now."  
Jamison rejected that mindset. Until he was fourteen and one of them went too far.  
The school boys had found the meadow. The lake was almost empty, only a few of the flock lurked under the water. The kids found the eggs floating at the surface. And as kids were, they began to play with them. The moment Akande noticed the voices, heard someone scream "How dare you, you monster!" through the water, he swam up, only to see shapes move away from the shore.  
He poked his head out, staying low. And saw something horrible.  
The children had pluck eggs from the net, smashed them on stones and stumped on them in the grass. In the distance he saw their silhouettes, screaming and laughing as they pushed around another boy. Akande knew that shock of blond hair too well.

The next time they saw each other again was at night. Jamison was messy, his eyes puffy and his knees shaky. His head was in a bind. The boys had shuffed him against a tree. His mother told the school he would never return.  
"Three. We lost three" Akande growled, as he sat with him, his face dark. "I should have been faster."  
"I should have made sure they didn't stalk me." Jamison returned and hugged his legs. His whole body felt hurt.  
Akande shook his head. "My mother...she sent away those who should have stated with the net. They are not welcome here anymore."  
"I'm sorry." Jamison muttered and began to sob, as he left sooner than he had arrived. What-ifs would haunt him for the rest of the year. He didn't have the guts to look into Akande's face anymore. He'd spent his fifteenth birthday with his mother this year. And not return.

Until next year...


	4. Birthday

By now Akande had grown suspicious of humans. Rarely they were peaceful when he encountered them. Of course he kind of admired them for their smarts and their endurance, but in the end they were cruel creatures, self-centered and willing to destroy whatever was in their way. After all, something must be foul with a species that mistreated their own kind.  
Jamison, or Jamie as his siblings started to call him, seemed like the exception of the rule at first, but the years of bullying by his peers had began to show within the last few years. He had aggressive fits that often just ended with him crying and Akande was sure these outbreaks of emotion happened more often when he was at home. Akande started to feel the tooth of time gnaw on them. They were growing up. Became people. And it was a scary thought. What if Jamison would become just like them? Narcissistic and cruel?  
He hoped by the souls of the lost that this will never be the case.

After the incident with his bullies Jamison came less frequently to visit the flock. He blamed his mother."I'll be homeschooled again. Mama doesn't want me to be around those bastards anymore. And since she wants to send me to university she thinks it's best to give me extra hours as well." he explained at his sixteenth birthday, chewing on a piece of bread he brought with him and shared with Akande and a few of the siblings.  
However he can't shake off the feeling that Jamison was guilt tripping himself over the incident still.  
The flock had shrunken since they took harbor in the lake. Sans the children they were only ten people left. There were always offspring who don't turn older than a few years, be it through them being too weak or too curious for their own good or people leaving the flock to form their own. But here...  
Some of their flock were killed by humans. Others by wild boars or wolves. The elderly died of exhaustion and age. And it left him in a terrifying spot.  
The same year Akande turned nineteen he lost his mother to the call of nature. Ade was too brave and strong of a person to be taken by anyone else but time itself.  
Mers don't have funerals. The closest thing they have to this was the journey: The lost one was wrapped in seaweed and given back to the ocean.  
Jamison helped that night. He still had that barrel contraption that he used to carry Akande back to shore.  
The boys brought her body to a rapid arm of the stream and sank the body into the waves, the seaweed bundle moving towards the sea.  
"This seems so unceremonious." Jamison hummed with a lump in his throat.  
"The circle of life is unceremonious, Jamison. Life gives, life takes." The mer reached out to help his friend up the steep.  
"Sure, but she's your mother. It feels so..."  
"Are you questioning our rituals?"  
"No, of course not, but you seem so calm. When...when Father died I was devastated, but you..."  
"I don't have time for this. With her departure we are without an elder to lead us. That is more troubling."  
"It's fine to let yourself feel something, Akande."  
"I'm afraid I don't have the same luxuries as you do."  
Jamison hummed quietly before he took the mer's hand in his own two.  
Akande took a shaky breath. No time for weakness. No time for that. He was becoming an adult and it started to hurt.

While their meetings became less frequent, they became longer and more important to the two of them. They spend hours just idly lingering in the water or at the lakeside, eating bread Jamison made with his mother and played with Akande's siblings or the other offspring. Being the last of their warriors Akande took over the duty to care for the kindergarten. He saw it as his duty. It was the only way to keep the flock alive. And while he was slowly becoming a stoic brute - as young mer tend to do - he took his job very serious and, to a degree, liked being amongst the children. They irradiated a cheerfulness that only a child can have, even in dark times.  
Akande would watch the kids group up and sneak up on him or Jamison and try to tackle the much, much taller lads to the ground. Sometimes it worked with Jamison and the blond would topple over, laughing with the kids.  
These scenes made Akande's heart flutter.

He had thought about this often lately. Could Jamison and him even be in a romantic relationship? Was Jamison even interested? He knew love was a troublesome topic for him. He remembered his depression over his father not wanting his son to be raised to become a flamboyant man-child, craving to be a woman or something. Nevertheless Jamison had expressed a liking towards other men before, under ashamed whispers and teary eyes as if it was a dark secret. Humans and their social constructions were weird. Akande was wondering, even though he would never describe himself as what the humans would call a man, would Jamison have him?  
Could he be his?

The night of Jamison's eighteenth birthday came fast and it led Akande down old paths. He wanted to be the first to see him. Oddly enough, the young man sat by the fountain. Old habits die hard.  
He saw him and he jumped up, thin and tall and with a wide grin. Like everytime he saw him.  
"James."  
"Akande!" he jumped up and ran to his friend, arms spread for a friendly hug.  
Instead of his usual hand gesture and a one-armed hug however, the mer hooked both arms around Jamison's thin frame, holding him tight to his blue, leathery skin.  
Startled by this unusual display of affection Jamison hesitated before returning the hug, his face hiding a little in Akande's frankly massive shoulder.  
"Happy birthday, James." he muttered into the bright hair that reminded him of the warm sun. Jamison would giggle, a playful noise.  
"Thanks. You are, uh..."  
Words seemed to fail him when he saw Akande's face. His expression was gentle, a look he would only toss after the human behind his back until now. A look that made Jamison's cheek glow and his gold-brown eyes shimmer.  
This gaze gave Akande bravery. His hand reached out to brush one of the reddened cheeks, Jamison slowly leaning into the touch like a shy cat.

It was so easy, to just tilt his head and lean over. The kiss was careful, the mer and the human untrained in it, Jamison holding him weakly around his waist and Akande cupping his face in his hand like a precious item. They broke off, just to let go a giggle or two before meeting again, lips locking onto each other. Jamison was blushing hard, his expression coy but happy as he held onto the mer around his waist, hot face digging back into his shoulder.  
"You're the worst."  
A glimmer of hurt poked through Akande's dark eyes. "Not good?"  
"No. No, it was...amazing."  
And he sealed the statement with another embrace and another kiss.

This was the moment which completely tied up the destinies of Jamison Junkenstein and Akande. If the human boy would have not trusted his childish curiosity, he would not be standing in the middle of the night, sharing tender moments with the sea creature he met a decade ago at the same spot they were standing at now.  
It was then, in that night, his path in life changed. And caught the attention of a witch...


	5. Love

They were blissfully unaware of it, but Akande and Jamison had been a couple long before they shared their first kiss. The flock at least saw it that way. Even Camilla, even though she didn't know who was her son's crush, knew Jamie was head over heels for someone. If her attitude would change, would she know that the love of her child was not human? Was her motherly strong enough for that.  
"I can't tell her." Jamison mused one night, Akande by his side, fixing a net with a dozen of knots.  
"She will find out sooner or later. Your mother is a smart woman."  
"My father didn't want a queer in his family and I'm sure she would want one either."  
"Whatever that is. I'm sure she would not dare to push you away. She loves you."  
"I'm not sure if her love for me is bigger than her wish for grandchildren. Can't exactly give her that when I'm with a man, like some sissy."  
Akande scoffed. "You keep insisting I'm a man."  
"Because you are! Or you look like one..." Only now did Jamison notice the mer's hurt expression. "I'm...sorry. I forgot."  
"I'm well aware what I look like in the eyes of a human. You don't need to remind me."  
"Akande. I didn't mean to be rude."  
"I know. You never do." He placed his corner of the net down. "Who we are will always be a thorn in someone's eye. Best we can do is hope that the people who matter are not like that."  
Jamison groaned before tugging at his hair. "I'm just...scared, you know? I will go to university soon and...and what happens after that?"  
"We will find out, once the time comes."

Jamison opened his mouth, but closed it again when he felt a weight on his head. A group of children from the flock had snuck up on the two from behind, two carrying one who placed something akin to a crown on Jamison's head. It was like the flower crowns they had made once or twice, but this time decorated with sea shells and a redish, spiky material Jamison has never seen before. Just when he had slipped his crown off to investigate it, he saw the kids place a second one on his head as well. The mer reacted flustered, waving his arm.  
"Will you stop that already!"  
The children ran and jumped into the water of the lake to join the others.  
Jamison hummed quietly and smiled as he put the crown back on. "The sardines got a lot of time on their hands, hm?"  
Akande nodded, his face darken from being flustered. Curiously Jamison leaned over and eyed Akande's crown. "The red bits..."  
"Coral." Akande muttered and took the ring of plants and minerals off. "We...we put those onto bonding crowns."  
"Oh?"  
Snickering came from the lakeside and Akande tossed glares at the children like daggers.  
"What is a bonding?" Jamison asked. And added in his head why you would be throwing mean looks at the sardines for giving them gifts.  
Akande scratched a spot on his shoulder. "It's...basically it's a ritual. Some perform it when they found a new flock. Or when they want to become permanent mating partners. It's a promise, basically."  
Jamison felt the heat crawl up his face. "Oh. It's...so it's like, a wedding?"  
"It, uh. It's mostly performed in water, so yes, you might get very wet, but - "  
"Nooo! We humans, we got something similar! A wedding. Couples do that to get tax benefits and stuff. But originally it's a love thing, you know? To show that you want to be with your loved one until the day you die..."  
The mer hummed and looked quietly at the crown in his lap. "I...yeah, I guess it's kind of like that. Yes."  
Awkwardness fell over the scene again, the tall mer slowly shaking his head.  
"Have you ever thought about it?"  
"What do you mean?"  
He turned and saw Jamison had put the crown back on.  
Akande understood the question now. He let go a chuckle. "Have you?"  
"I gotta, one day. Continuing the Junkenstein legacy. Whatever that is."  
"A legacy or a name is not what makes a family important."  
Jamison nodded, going back to tying knots.  
Slowly Akande's large figure slipped closer to his side and as if it was second nature, Jamison leaned his head against his shoulder, seeking comfort.  
"Maybe I will bond you to me, one day."  
"No empty promises."  
"Have I ever broken a promise?"  
"Well, that one time when you promised to not laugh at me when you tried to teach me to swim, and you laughed anyway because I got scared by a fish stroking past my leg."  
"Hahaha, you have to admit, it was very funny though."  
"For you." There was a smile on Jamison's face as he nuzzled against Akande's neck, his breath tickling his gils and drawing giggling out of the big mer.  
The children watched them in pride.

The summer seemed to pass by too quickly. The last summer they would have together for a long time. Jamison and Akande had grown up with the knowledge they could only see each other during these precious four to five months. The rest of the year the flock, even as small as it was nowadays, would move to the oceans for the colder months. This summer was Jamison's last one before he would move away, three towns over, for his studies. He convinced his mother to send him to this school early on. His dream of becoming an engineer had only grown since then.  
"I will be home from July to September. It falls right into mating time." He declared one night, moving up and down in front of the old fountain, excitement filling his voice. "I will finally be able to show the world my abilities. I will finally show everyone the stuff I'm made of."  
Akande, too big to fit into the fountain by now, sat with crossed arms at its edge, head tilted. "You want to expand your abilities and test your knowledge with others. Admirable It always fascinated me how wound up you would get over gears and screws. I'm sure you will make a fine craftsman."  
Jamison stopped in his tracks, eying Akande. He has never heard that tune of voice on him. "You sound...upset."  
The mer glanced up, sighing quietly. "I'm just...The flock elected me as the new elder."  
"And?"  
"The others want to stay away from Adlersbrunn for a while."  
"...I can't blame them."  
Jamison had seen enough violence happening to the flock to understand.  
"But...you will come back, right?"  
"I hope so. The flock will always be the highest priority. I hope you can..."  
"I understand it." Jamison came up to Akande, his hands cupping the mer's cheeks, thumb stroking his scales.

"I love you."  
"Hmm?" Jamison's cheeks flushed.  
"I said, I love you, James."  
It was at this point that Jamison began to fight with tears, a flood of emotions suddenly hitting him. His embrace around the mer's shoulders was strong.  
"I love you, too, you warrior, you."  
And for the first time in ages, Akande had to hold back sobs.

Time apart always hurts. Now more than ever, with the boy's heart so tight in Akande's grip. The journey to the university was an oddly silent trip in the carriage, Jamison's mother being openly close to tears, while her son tried to at least keep up a facade.  
The university was a small building of stone, a former fortress was now a house of knowledge. Jamison liked that irony. Unlike school he had to organize himself, find himself at lectures and work day and night through books. He found interest in chemistry, especially the one the Slavic wikings practiced. This technology could be devastating in the wrong hands.  
When he wasn't learning in the library or listening to lectures, he was in his dorm, isolated. Fellow students tried to make him join their brotherhood, but Jamison learned early that those were often just a thinly veiled excuses to meet a bunch of knuckleheads in the night time for rants about philosophy and politics while drinking oneself in a comatose state.  
Of course rumors of his apparent queerness spread like wildfire. But as long as these rumors did not result in violence against him again, the student couldn't care less.  
No, Jamison preferred to be for himself, his dorm having turned to a mess workshop within the first two weeks. Chemicals would bubble over the low flames of burned-down candles, bits and pieces of mechanical toys lay spread around, the stench of oil and ink ever so present. The low, orange light of his room gave him comfort in the lonely hours. Often he would write his thoughts down and toss them away in a bottle, down the river, in hopes it would float down the stream to the Moonshine Lake. He would know it was from him, Jamison reasoned. Whatever soothed his soul.

Sometimes he would dream of him. Of his dark green eyes, almost black, like the lowest spot of the ocean. Of his arms, strong and covered in blue scales, ending in sharp claw that would never dare to scratch him. Of his deep voice, a soothing bass that spoke in the same rhythm as his heart beat.  
He'd see him in his dreams, standing knee-deep in the water by the river, walking up to beach, Jamison running towards him, catching him in his arms as if they haven't seen each other for years. He would cling onto him, feeling his wet skin against his shirt, the tender claws holding him like a precious thing. He would caress his neckline, leave kisses all over it. Feel how his claw would wander over his side, grab bits of fabric to remove it and expose pale skin to cold night air.  
He dreamt of how they would embrace, lying in the sand, hidden by darkness and the dunes. He wondered if he could even do that with him. Of Akande would feel comfortable to be this rough with him, pin him to the ground to stroke over his lap and thighs and draw sharp groans from the blond.  
Jamison would always wake up with red cheeks and scold himself. How low has he sunken to objectify Akande like this? How was he supposed to ever explain this to him?

Unknown to the student, Adlersbrunn was in tumult. A blond woman in a brown coat had spread rumors. The creatures living by the Moonshine Lake, they are not as simple as one would think. They were monsters from the deep sea, feeding off of the farmer's crops, waiting just for the right time to sneak into your house and steal your child.  
The town had always been aware of them, but the fear of the Unknown kept most of them away.  
But now that they knew, they were not scared anymore. And they would carry fire over the meadows...


	6. The Doctor

Gossip spreads best between candle light and stone walls. The recent events in Adlersbrunn had reached the university late, three days after, and they tossed Jamison into a panic. Autumn had barely started and already the young man was on a carriage back, praying none of his worries ring true.

One of them wasn't. Despite the close proximity of their mansion to the woods, it and Camilla were unharmed by the bursts of fire that had spread over the surrounding greens of the town. At dusk, he decided to move along the stream. Praying his second worry wasn't true either.  
The story was bizarre. Farmers, craftsmen and soldiers grouped up and marched up the Moonshine Meadows, leaving behind a trail of dirt, soot and ash. Locals rumored almost a fourth of the Lord's lands are now gone.  
As Jamison lurked across the familiar path, he saw nothing familiar anymore. The trees were bare black skeletons made of coal, the grass was stepped flat and dead by too many feet and he was pretty sure he could smell burnt flesh from somewhere. He pushed the nightmarish thought aside.  
His lungs were aching from the smoke that still hang in the air when he reached the lake. Blood splatters covered the stones by the shore, the ripped nets floating on the surface. He was shaking. In the grass lay a bracelet.  
He recognized the seashells immediately. He collected them for Akande himself.

A scream broke through the evening air, shaking those who could hear it. And drawing up a smile on the features of the witch, who watched from the furthest corner of the dead forest, that from now on would be known as the Wilds by the locals.

At first he refused to believe. He would roam the woods and fields, every time he returned, trying to find clues, but only finding animal carcasses and broken eggs. More of them.  
Monsters. Bastards. Every single one in this town.  
They deserve no sympathy. They deserve pain.  
None of his bottled messages got a response. Even when he desperately tossed them into the ocean. Without a drive to return home, the man dove into his studies instead. Manically trying to keep his mind busy he tried to master whatever he could touch. Engineering. Biology. Chemistry. One of those coated him a leg. Foolish.  
It was worth while. He became one of the best students the university ever had. A doctor with barely thirty years old. And already graying.  
In the same year, Camilla had to be laid to rest, next to her beloved husband. The day after her funeral, the last staff who stayed with her until the end left the mansion as her son moved in. That was the day, on which Jamison became Junkenstein.

The doctor spent his life secluded. Even let his food be delivered rather than going out on the market himself. The only time people saw him was when he looked too deep into the glass at the tavern or when he tried to sell his ideas to a noble. He can't live off of the family's saved riches forever after all.  
The Lord of Adlersbrunn, who reigned over the town and its surroundings, was a gentle man. However he had little faith in the doctor. He knew his story: A former weakling, picked on by his peers for talking to himself. People called him crazy. Bewitched, even.  
He mostly tolerated the scientist, gave him funds to work on his weird "robots" as he called them. A promising addition to his military force for sure.  
This is how it would go. For over seven years.  
And still, the witch waited patiently.

...

It was quiet at the tavern that October night. Only the old soldier and his alchemist friend sat in their usual corner as Junkenstein bent over his notes. The secret project that had been taken form in his basement still required parts. And he would need to find a way to get those.  
"Evening, doc!"  
He twitched, glancing at the bard of the tavern. A bright young man with an even brighter smile. "What's that face about, man? Got the boot from Wilhelm again?"  
"If you wanna put it like that." he scoffed back, pushing his empty glass away. When Lúcio started talking to him, Junkenstein knew it was a slow business day.  
The bard set his lite aside. "Hey, have you heard the rumors?"  
"Which ones? This bloody town does nothin' but gossip."  
"About the swamp monster, man! The hunter has seen it. Like, two and a half meters tall, almost as wide, blue skin, sharp teeth..."  
"McCree talks a lot when he's tipsy. And even if, it might just be some stray mer. One of those these bastards haven't killed..."  
"Wait, you say there are mer people around here?" Lúcio was not originally from the town. Might explain his less superstitious attitude.  
"Last living ones I saw was fifteen years ago." Junkenstein hummed and left coin next to his spot on the table as he packed his books.  
"You saw them?" Lúcio seemed to beam in excitement.  
"Saw. Note the past tense, bard. They are not around anymore, because a bunch of scared farmers slaughtered them and their offspring. Those you spot nowadays probably only pass by on their way to the oceans. Like many sea creatures do."  
"Wow! You know a lot about them. You learned that in academia?"  
"Most of it." He lied. His backpack was heavy from his utensils. "...McCree saw them in the swamp, you say?"  
Lúcio nodded.  
The doctor hummed quietly before pulling his hood up.

He had become a night owl by now, using the safety of the darkness as a shield for what felt like a definite crime. The doctor often roamed the Wilds, musing in vague memories and lost dreams as he eyed the dead trees. Rain fall and decay had turned the surroundings of the old lake into a field of morass. Too quick for the doctor's liking, almost as if magic had it hand in it. But that couldn't be the case. The barren nature of the Wilds made it attractive for vagabonds who hope to find a short cut in the muddy paths. But the quicksand-like gunk had claimed countless lives by now and it still will, until it finally dries out.  
Junkenstein would seek out these corpses for his project, even the ones of clueless animals. It felt more tactful than raiding a graveyard, but no less illegal or ethic.  
Armed with a shovel and a bucket Junkenstein would slip around the trees, too familiar with the surroundings to trip over a root or fall into a puddle. Sometimes he would nick a berry from a bush here and there. A small sign that life was slowly returning to this husk of a forest.

He must have been too deep in his thoughts. Or maybe he underestimated the fatality of the darkness. But somehow, he ended up falling and not finding grip.  
Instantly, Junkenstein felt mud run into his boots, sucking him deeper into the wet soil of the swamp. Already knee-deep within seconds. The doctor tried not to panic...but by now, panic had become his second nature. He wound himself, trying to find a root or a tree arm he could pull himself out of. Only to drop deeper and deeper.  
Thighs gone.  
Hips gone.  
The metallic arm got stuck, too, drawn down by a gentle yet strong force. This can't be normal quicksand.

"Help...help!" His voice echoed. Screaming, as if he didn't know no one would hear him.  
He felt his body tremble, sad last attempts to free himself. The trembling followed a weep. A sob.  
He began to cry. Is this really how he would go out of this world? Eaten by a bog, like the people who's bodies he used to steal from here? Would he meet an angry mob of ghosts by the pearly gates?  
Would he meet his parents there?  
Or maybe even...

Through teary eyes and sad thoughts he barely noticed the muddy footsteps coming from behind his back, as well as the shadow looming over him. He only took actual notice once an enormous hand took hold of him. Following the hand that held him the doctor's eyes trailed along a strong arm covered in dark green and blue scales and many old scars.  
A tiny voice in him screamed in excitement. Eureka, he was right! There was a mer living in the swamp. His eyes kept wandering, but before he reached the mer's face, the large hand dragged and tugged at him, pulling him out of the sand. The doctor lost one of his shoes, but that was little damage.  
He sat against a large root poking out of the ground, trying to catch his breath.  
"Tha....thanks..." He muttered, looking up.  
The mer was leaving already, heavy steps taking it into the darker parts of tge woods.  
Junkenstein hopped up. "Oi! Wait a minute!"  
The creature gave off a low, rattling noise. He could barely make our their features in the shadows of the trees, but what Jamison did notice was a large gauntlet hanging from their arm, that seemed to be made of crustaceans and sea shells.  
He took off his glove and the scientist showed off the jewelry underneath it. His and Akande's intertwined. Slowly he raised that hand and tapped himself two times against the shoulder.  
"I won't harm ya. I'm a friend of ya people."  
The mer's eyes couldn't break through the darkness but Junkenstein felt eyes drill into him.

"Leave."

"What?"

"Leave this place. And never come back."

The mer's voice crawled under Junkenstein's skin as they inched away, disappearing in the darkness.  
He began to shiver.  
He knew that voice.


	7. Dream

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Trigger Warning: Drug Abuse

The mansion of the family Junkenstein was a beautiful building, but it was definitely run down enough that anyone seeing it from a distance would avoid it at all cost. Which was just fine for the doctor who had become a hermit within his own walls, only poking his head out under the safe blanket of the night.  
No one was allowed in. No one but him. If they found his work he would be locked up. If they knew that he dug up bodies to create new life.  
Many it was his loneliness who forced his hand. But the doctor always was driven to create 'company'. His robots were simple constructs but they had a basic understanding of how to react to certain things. They became the closest thing to servants he had left, as the ones of flesh and blood practically fled the house after his mother's passing.

To keep himself sane, he would talk. To the robots, to his books, to the flowers in the garden he still tended to - and to Mako.  
That's what he named him. A large man, put on a slap in the basement of the mansion, to hide himself from sight and to mask the smell of rot and chemicals.  
Junkenstein was not even close to finished. But the large creature under the cloth in his lab already had found a place in his heart. After all, if you work on a project for so long, you grow attached to it...

"Say, Mako! Did I ever tell ya 'bout that one time I smooched a fish?" he hummed, stitching a new fat finger with care onto the creature's palm.  
Of course he got no answer. Mako was but a cruel lumb of rotting flesh, stinking up the place. But to Junkenstein he was already a person.   
One with a stoic nature, in his mind. Despite his rational knowledge of dead people being unable to talk, he heard a quiet grunt in his head. Like a little sleepy pig.  
He giggled. "Not literally, ya silly! Pretty sure if he heard that I called him a fish, he'd break me back."  
He continued to stitch and mutter. "Best friend o' mine he used ta be. A mer. Ya know. Kinda like mermaids, but more fishy. We kinda grew up tagether. Playin games, readin books. Every damn summer. Was a good times."  
He could have sworn he heard another grunt.  
"Oh, yeah, should have seen him! He was, like, tall with broad shoulders, had a real low voice that makes ya want him ta read ya poetry ta..."  
Junkenstein paused.  
"He was...the bravest person I ever met."  
Another noise echoed in his head. It made him laugh.  
"I was all over him. As soon as I knew I was inta men...pretty sure he might have made it worse. Even though he ain't really a man. Mer don't have gender roles really like humans do."  
Another noise.  
"Okay, okay! Geez! Impatient bastard!...I'd visit him all the bloody time though. Every bloody summer. He'd show me how ta build things o' we'd play with his siblings. Sometimes I read him fairy tales o' we ate bread tagether. I taught him how ta dance. He taught me some swimmin'..."  
Even in his head there was no sound. His words faded away almost with a melancholic heaviness.  
"We kissed when I was eighteen. We kissed a lot after that. O' napped tagether. O' held hands."  
He paused his work, fingers too shaky to continue.  
"...I'll go ta bed early taday me thinks." he hummed, tossing a look at the clock. Three in the morning.  
He placed the giant palm of his project back on the slap, stuffing it under the protective blanket. "Sorry, Mako. Hope ya don't mind. I'm not...feelin' it anymore  
A quick, apologetic ruffle where hair was supposed to be and the doctor sighed. "Three more weeks, mate. Then I'll get ya walkin'. Promise."

He made his way upstairs, knees weak and arms heavy. The sudden trip down Nostalgia Lane didn't help either. He remembered what happened a few days ago in the Wilds. That mer...he sounded like him. But it could not be him. Akande and his flock were murdered. No one has ever seen them loom near any body of water in Adlersbrunn.  
It was wishful thinking at best. The quiet hope that death was not permanent after all...

His bedroom was the neatest room in the whole mansion. He rarely slept in his bed anymore. No wonder that the stump of his leg and his back ached like they did. But it was his own fault for working himself to the bone. Moodless he began to strip to his underwear, the lab coat and pants covered in spots for three days ago, the shirt stinking of sweat. He threw it on a pile, groaning at its height. He needed to upgrade the washing bot with a clock system.  
Almost bare Junkenstein dropped into the sheets, parts of his back pinching and his leg aching from the pressure it had to endure all day. He had to find a better solution for that then the peg leg he made himself on a whim.  
His hand reached for his night desk, digging into it with an almost scary precision. He took way too many of these pills. More than he knew he should. But at this point he couldn't care less. The ache would keep him from sleeping otherwise.  
Two should be enough. He didn't need water anymore to get them down. Once he did, he tried to settle into the pillows, his glasses finding a spot on the desk. They, bent by age and use, were dirty from chemicals as well.

The pain dulled down with the time. Enough for him to slip into something resembling sleep. His mind felt dull, as if the world around him was slowly wrapped in a curtain, the fabric silky and shimmering. And dark.  
His eyes were heavy enough to fall shut, enveloping himself with darkness. The night was calm, only a few bots hummed in the distance and the old clock in the dinning room just hit four.  
In his daze the doctor often saw shapes move. The drugs do that to a weak man's mind.   
Sometimes he thought he saw his mother in the corner, stitching flower pictures onto pillows.   
Sometimes he saw his father coming into the room, grabbing a book and beginning to read from it for his son.   
And sometimes he saw a large frame of a person inch to his bed, begging for space. And a hug. And a kiss on his fins.  
No wonder that, when Junkenstein heard the door open, he pushed it onto his sleep paralysis.

The ghost of his sleep was large, broad shoulders that gave of a blue gleam. The silhouette of the mer from the Wilds. The steps they took were gentle, as if trying to not wake him. How nice of his dream.  
He chuckled lowly, throat clocked by his own spit.  
"I've been thinkin o' ya a lot lately."  
Weight shifted on the mattress. As if they sat down to his side. The doctor closed his eyes again, giggling. "Ya remind me so much o' him. Ain't a day I don't think o' him. And his smile. And his lips."  
His mind tried to trail away, give in to sleep.  
But then, he felt touch. This dream was so vivid.  
His hair was brushed with a gentleness he hasn't felt in years.

"James. What happened to you?"

Junkenstein chuckled without humor. James. He would always call him that.   
"I'm a wreck." he replied, aware he talked to a fever dream. How else was the ghost mer supposed to know his name? "Jus' a sad man. Griefin'."  
The hand in his hair cupped a cheek. The ghost's voice became low and sad, dark green eyes gleaming back as Junkenstein opened his own again.  
"I'm so sorry...I couldn't risk you being hurt."  
The doctor laughed and hid his face in the pillows. "Oh, stop. Ya makin me cry here."  
He was already crying however, tears wetting the soft cloth. These dreams always hit him in the guts. Made him want to hide away, wish he would just become a piece of void, unable of thought or emotion.  
The large hand still roamed through his hair, moving white strands aside.  
The low voice continued, a subtle shake under it. "Your hair...your leg...who did...who did this to you?" The weight shifted and Junkenstein could have sworn something leaned onto him. "...I'm so sorry."  
"Don't be. I got what I deserve." Junkenstein muttered and his head leaned up.  
The ghost's eyes were looming over him, shining dull and weak. Light blue scales were marbled by scars and darker spots of blue.  
The doctor's eyes began to break open again. In his dreams he'd never look this worn. He never imagined how Akande would look like in his own age. After all...he was dead...

"What do you want?" he finally asked.  
The intruder brushed fabric aside and seemed to climb over to nest themself into the soft cushions. The arm with the gauntlet rested heavy bit gentle around his waist.  
Junkenstein slipped closer, seeking the warmth of the other body, as he slipped away again, whimpering against a big shoulder.

"Akande...?"  
The grip didn't loosen. "James...My pearl..."

This can't be a dream.  
And even if it was, it was a beautiful one.


	8. Morning

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> NSWF content ahead, not explicit.

The windows were hung with heavy cloth, so that no light would break directly into the room once the sun began to rise. It would blind Junkenstein otherwise and rid him of sleep.  
Today however, nothing could have woken him up. The comfort of weight around his waist from a strong arm, the pressure of another warm body against his own naked skin, the soft feeling of the blankets wrapping both of them in. It kept the doctor safe and sound in a dreamless sleep. The best night of sleep he had in years.  
The fear of waking up and realizing all was but a dream, another trick by his crippling mind, was ever so present. His eyes would open in random intervals and...  
There he was. His face looked weather torn and uneven from several cuts, but the sleep made him look gentle and peaceful. The light blue skin shimmered in the dim light of the bedroom, as did the heavy gauntlet that took up almost all of his right arm.  
Junkenstein trailed his fingers along the scars, hands shaking and his throat knotting itself shut.  
Akande lives.  
 _Akande lives._

He inched closer, his head nudging itself under the mer's chin. His arms clung around Akande's middle, face dug for his neck, tears welling up again.  
Junkenstein felt the other hand ran through his hair, claws brushing his scalp so gently to not hurt him. It drew sobs out of him, again.  
"I'm so sorry." came out of the doctor's mouth, voice layered in grief.  
The mer opened his eyes weakly, those deep green gems still were able to dig deep holes into Junkenstein's heart.  
He repeated his plead. "I'm so sorry...I should...I tried to find you, I was..."  
"You would not have found me. You could not." His voice is heavy, a deep bass. He barely used it anymore.  
Junkenstein looked up. The bliss of their reunion fogged his mind enough to not question this statement.  
Instead he reached around his neck and pulled him in.

The kiss was clumsy. Both of them were out of practice. But that didn't matter.  
The need washed over both of them, the kiss turning to kisses and their embrace becoming more entangled. Here and there was a little chuckle, the happiness spilling over in as they tugged at each other, their lips unable to part for minutes.  
Somehow he ended up on his back again and Jamison gasped for air as if drowning. His view was blurry without the glasses and with his emotions running wild, but he could see Akande's shape loom over him. Almost instinctively Jamison raised his good leg to wrap it around his hip, but the mer sat up.  
"Don't move."  
There was authority in his voice, but no ill will. Jamison listened, his hands brushing over his arms, feeling up taunt muscles and uneven patches of scales and scars.  
How was it, that even now, fifteen years later, covered in old wounds, he was still so incredibly handsome? How was it that the time separated from him he had grown to love him more? Was it grief? The guilt not having spent his youth to the fullest?  
Did that all even matter really right now? The mer was in his lap, grinding up on him, the low groans filling the room with a lustful echo.  
Junkenstein would join in soon, moaning from the sensation as their voices became a muffled song.

All morning they spent like that in the bedroom. They took turns, making sure no inch of the other's body was left untouched, no tender word unsaid. Junkenstein had to stop riding in Akande's lap at one point, tears build up again.  
How can he say that? He can't be seriously desire a cripple like him. He lost a leg and, as far as other were concerned, his mind, too. He was sickly thin and paler than ever, hair gone white and face wrinkled from stress and exhaustion.  
Why would he come back and stay, despite finding him like this?  
He felt a tear being kissed away.  
"Too much?" came in that heavy voice again.  
He swallowed the knot in his throat down. "N-no...I'm fine..."  
Maybe it was a dream after all.

Noon came, and with it the sun settled over the building, the room now in tender orange hues from what little light managed to break through the curtains. The two old lovers were still entangled, the gauntlet loosely swung over Junkenstein's back, their sweating bodies still close with the mer's hips lazily grinding up against the doctor's. Even after hours, they were still at it. However the needy, rough nature had slowly melted away. What was left behind was the affection, the desire to be close. No chase for a climax, just him under him as he filled him out, drawing hissy moans from the mer.  
After a while he had to pause, the friction becoming too much. Junkenstein rested his forehead against Akande's, who chuckled quietly when he saw the flustered and exhausted expression. His free hand ran through his hair.  
"Do you want to stop?"  
Junkenstein gasped and shook his head, arms going around his neck.   
"No. No. I don't...I don't want this to end..."  
He tried to pick his pace back up, but gave in after a few thrusts.  
Akande let go a groan, before the hand in Junkenstein's hair went around his head and pulled him into a hug.  
"You have nothing to proof."  
Junkenstein whimpered one last time, before he slowly pulled out.  
And he was still there.

They stayed like that, the doctor's limb body resting on the mer's, fingers shyly trailing over rough skin. Catching breathes it seemed as if the world stood still, but the ticking of the nearby clock destroyed that hope for him.  
He sat slowly up, his hair hanging in his face or sticking to his forehead from sweat. His back hurt again but the pain was dulled down compared to other nights.  
Even now, exhausted and tired, he could not let go however. He rested up against Akande, laying as close as he could next him.  
"Ya really alive." he muttered, as if the realization finally struck.  
Akande replied with a humm, low and throaty. "So you did not for sure? And you still kept searching?"  
"I kept hopin' I was wrong. Kinda pathetic, hm?" he tried to joke, but the humor didn't reach Akande's mind.  
Instead the hand with the enormous gauntlet brushed his hair aside with a single finger.  
Junkenstein brushed over the seams of the glove like objects, feeling against what must have been a crab's shell once. "Don't ya wanna take that thing off?"  
"I can't."  
The doctor sat a little up. "What do ya mean?"

"If I did, I would break my contract with the Witch."

"...wait, what. Hold up, reel back." The doctor now sat up proper. There was a dull sting in his lower body, but not enough to make it uncomfortable.  
"A witch?"  
"Not just any. The Witch of the Wilds." The mer turned between the sheets. "I made deal with her. She makes sure my people can stay in safe havens, and in turn I have to roam the Wilds to make sure no human enters."  
"The flock is fine, too?" Junkenstein's voice wasn't this clear and light in ages. "Even Abi? And Alito? Akili?"  
Akande smiled. "They are all well and safe. And grown up. Alito will have their first own offspring soon."

Junkenstein dropped onto the mattress, laughing quietly. He felt like an eternity since he felt this...calm. This harmonious.  
"The sardines are all alive...heh..."  
"I don't think they would take it lightly if you still called them sardines."  
"Did I ever care?"  
Snorted laugher, just like the old days.  
But only from Junkenstein.

Akande hummed quietly before he lifted his head and upper body.  
Junkenstein stayed in the cushions. "Fifteen years...Fifteen fuckin years."  
"The Witch bound me though the gauntlet to the forest and its swamp. I was not aware I could wander off this far...until you came. Somehow nosed your way into the Wilds."  
"Been doin that fo' a while. Fo' a project."  
Akande's head turned a little. "Of course. 'I need to...I've...not considered the witch might see the woods behind your home as part of her turf as well. Maybe then I would have dared to show my face again earlier..."  
"Why would ya not? Ya scared I suddenly think ya ugly?" There was a lighthearted nature to his voice. An attempt to lift the mood.  
It didn't work.  
"The Witch is a powerful force of nature. You have not seen her. Or her might. She is..."

He paused suddenly, fins flickering. His face cringed.  
"What is that smell?"  
"Smell?"  
The mer's fins and eyes became narrow. 

"It stinks. Of rotten flesh."


End file.
